ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Tuesday, June 18, 1996 TAG: 9606180077
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: JOEL TURNER STAFF WRITER
NEARLY 50 PERCENT of the city's students come from low-income families, and many of the kids need extra help with school.
Roanoke will have to trim its tutoring program for disadvantaged children next year to free money for salary increases for teachers and other rising costs, the program's director said.
Because of funding restrictions, Roanoke will drop its Title 1 program, which helps improve reading and math skills, at Huff Lane and Virginia Heights schools.
However, the city will still provide tutoring, computer assistance and other services for students at 12 schools that were threatened earlier with deep cuts in federal funds.
Roanoke had been faced with a $450,000 cut in federal money for the education program because earlier this year the House of Representatives approved a 17 percent reduction in the program nationwide.
But the Clinton administration opposed the cuts by House Republicans, and funding for Title I of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act was retained at the same level for next year.
Despite the level funding, Roanoke still will have to trim its Title I program to free money for salary increases for teachers and other rising costs, said Dolores Johns, director of the city's Title 1 program.
"Our expenses are going up, so we can't keep the same level of services with level funding," Johns said.
For 1996-97, Roanoke has received a tentative allocation of $2.6 million for the federal program, which is aimed at schools with a large number of children from low-income households. Up to 94 percent of the children at some elementary schools in the city come from low-income families, and nearly 50 percent of the city's enrollment falls into this category.
If the final allocation is more than the tentative amount, school officials said, the additional money will be used for instructional materials and staff training.
Johns said the special help for disadvantaged children will be eliminated at Huff Lane because it is an intermediate school that houses grades three through five. The city is restructuring the program to focus on children in the primary and early elementary grades.
"The idea is to use the program to help children improve their basic skills in the early grades," Johns said. "There will be less need for special help then in the upper elementary grades."
The services were eliminated at Oakland Intermediate School last year because of funding restrictions and the shift to the early grades.
Johns said Virginia Heights will be eliminated next year because "there just wasn't enough money to go around."
She said the money must be used in schools with the highest percentage of children from low-income families. In the ranking system, Virginia Heights ranked 13th among the elementary schools.
The program will be retained at the following elementary schools (with their percentage of low-income children): Hurt Park, 95 percent; Lincoln Terrace, 91; Forest Park, 87; Fallon Park, 78; Roanoke Academy of Mathematics and Science, 78; Morningside, 75; Westside, 63; Fairview, 61; Round Hill, 59; Highland Park, 57; Preston Park, 57; and Garden City, 56.
School officials are revising the program to focus on the early elementary grades in an effort to raise children's scores on standardized tests. They have set a goal of increasing the number of children scoring above the 50th percentile by 4 percent a year for each of the next three years.
In the revamped program, administrative costs will be trimmed so that at least 90 percent of the money is spent on student services, including teacher salaries, instructional materials, transportation and food, Johns said.
Most of the money will pay for the city's 36 teachers and 26 teacher's aides who give special attention to the disadvantaged children who have fallen behind academically.
Some federal funds will pay for instructional materials, field trips and bus transportation for children.
School officials also will use some money to pay part of the costs for an after-school tutoring program and a preschool program for disadvantaged 4-year-olds.
Special help was provided to nearly 1,500 children in the program in the past year.
LENGTH: Medium: 80 linesby CNB